"It will take several more hours for all customers and regions to return to full service," media relations director
"We will continue to work around the clock with our network partner
Chief technology officer
The intermittent wireless service issues left Rogers customers without phone or texting services beginning early Monday, with broad economic ramifications across
"It's a very big deal," said
In addition to personal communications, experts said the outage impacted business sales and services such as food delivery and curbside pickup, payments that require a wireless connection and the ability for people to work remotely.
The service interruption could also imapct health, with some Rogers customers saying they'd been unable to book or check in for medical appointments.
Garas apologized for the disruption and thanked customers for their patience.
According to Downdetector, a website that tracks outages, problems were reported in most major Canadian cities.
Although the service disruption appeared concentrated in southern
Users said they were unable to place or receive cellphone calls or text messages.
Rogers owns a national wireless network that does business under the Rogers, Fido and Chatr brands.
It's one of
The massive outage could flame concerns about telecommunications consolidation and costs in
"It's infrastructure, it's equipment and it's going to fail here and there," he said. "But the fact that we're paying more than most of the consumers around the world would suggest that our tolerance for outages like this is probably quite limited."
According to an investor page on the Rogers website, the telecommunications company provides both postpaid and prepaid wireless services to about 10.9 million consumer and business subscribers in the Canadian wireless market.
Some of those users expressed frustration on social media, noting that they rely on the wireless service as they work from home under ongoing COVID-19 restrictions.
"We’re in another major lockdown here in
"I thought my call wasn't going through because so many people are trying to get vaccines today," she said during a Google Meet interview.
"Then I realized I couldn't make any calls," Collier said. "They're saying it's intermittent, but my phone hasn't worked all day. It's clearly an absolutely massive outage."
With her home internet still working, Collier said she was able to work as usual. But she worried about how the wireless outage impacted people trying to get a COVID-19 vaccine.
"I'm concerned that on the first day of vaccination appointments basically opening, people who are relying on their phones to make an appointment have been cut off," she said.
Milton resident
"It's frustrating because I'm trying to operate a business from home and that's the number that everyone has," he said. "I just had to take my son to the orthodontist and I couldn't check in on my phone."
Several emergency services organizations explained that while wireless customers could still place 911 calls during a service interruption, they were unable to receive a call back.
"People should still continue calling 911 for emergencies and remain on the line until an operator speaks to them," Cpl.
"They should also watch for updates/direction from their local police (including local RCMP where we are the police of jurisdiction) as well as Rogers for updates regarding affected areas."
The
"We are experiencing several 911 drop calls that require followup,"
This report by
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